you're saying that there is no causal relationship between where one attends law school and how capable one is as a lawyer. was that your point?

You've missed the point, entirely. Alright. So then, what if an employer claims that in 20 years of experience, they've somehow arrived at the notion that their white lawyers are as you say "awesome" and their lawyers of color are just "mediocre?" Is this a best proxy? Should the employer just go along with this proxy? And what would be the consequences of going along with this proxy? What would be suspiciously problematic about it?

Or what if an employer finds that their male lawyers are "awesome" and that their female lawyers are "mediocre?" How should they proceed with that proxy? Or what if an employer finds that their protestant lawyers are "awesome" and their Hindu lawyers are "mediocre?" What should that employer do with that proxy?

My point is, one's law school as a determining factor is just as ridiculous, problematic, and arbitrary as a "best proxy" as any of the above. Moreover, it's never just one variable that causes a particular result, it's a culmination of many variables, and as an employer, you have to be able to recognize these variables.

so your basic point is that people who go to lower-ranked schools should be a protected class like people of particular racial, ethnic, religious or gender groups, is that right? discrimination based on school ranking is just as bad as discrimination based on race, ethnicity, religion, or gender?

My point is, one's law school as a determining factor is just as ridiculous, problematic, and arbitrary as a "best proxy" as any of the above.

Logic FAIL. Students don't get randomly assigned to law schools. The best schools cherrypick the candidates that are most likely to be good lawyers in the future. The other schools are left with the rest. People are randomly born male, or black, or any of those other factors you mention. People don't randomly get into Yale. Your analogy is flawed.

I don't think that the best schools make the best lawyers. The students that enter the top schools are already better. The top schools just have to not screw them up. If Cooley and Yale were equal, Cooley would have to be so much better than Yale that they could take marginal undergraduate students with bad LSAT scores and other soft factors and make them as good at practicing law as people that have far surpassed them in academic and other achievement previously.

It's increasingly apparant that you're just trying to rationalize your own credentials. The funny thing is that I don't think all T3 or T4 students are destined to be horrible lawyers. It's pretty clear that you are though.

Years from now, if you happen to be making hiring decisions, you can do whatever you want. Until then (unless you go into solo practice after law school) you're stuck with the hiring system currently in place. Arguing about it 'til you're blue in the face is pointless.

True. But we don't bear the burden of proving that our position isn't batshit crazy, so there's that.

it's always easier to argue for the status quo.

I'm not arguing for anything. I think that T3 or T6 or T14 or tier distinctions are fairly arbitrary. I haven't said anything about the things should be.

It's actually a very simple question, in the end: how could schools with less restrictive admissions standards produce better lawyers than schools with more restrictive admissions standards? If that were true, the Yales of the world would actually be doing a worse job at educating students than the Cooleys of the world, since the Cooleys of the world have to close the gap they have from the beginning. The Yales of the world would be doing a worse job despite having 1.) their pick of faculty, 2.) better facilities, and 3.) more money.

[quietly awaits a diatribe on "the inequities of the paradigm and the bifurcated stratification of legal education]

vansondon

My point is, one's law school as a determining factor is just as ridiculous, problematic, and arbitrary as a "best proxy" as any of the above.

Logic FAIL. People are randomly born male, or black, or any of those other factors you mention. People don't randomly get into Yale. Your analogy is flawed.

Oh yes, I love it when you talk to me all dirty! Sexy!

And just for the record, there is nothing flawed about my analogy. Actually, many people do choose their religious affiliation. And you can substitute other categories, like political affiliation, or source of income (protected classes). People have plenty of latitude and random space in choosing this. So inasmuch as I acknowledge your rebuttal, my analogy stands firm. Of course, it doesn't surprise me that you aren't smart enough to know any of this.

I think it's a shame that there is this unfortunate and elitist perception fueling the dilemmas of this discussion, but I acknowledge the unfortunate reality. As I see it, it really shouldn't matter which law school you go to (of any tier, whether ABA accredited or not), as long as the school offers a solid legal education and there is some national uniformity in standards. Unfortunately, employers do place a high premium on this. I feel like it should be illegal to discriminate against someone because of the school s/he attended. It is all so arbitrary and ridiculous.

Lol at this.

Care to elaborate on your internet laughter?

Just enjoying your vision of a world where there's basically no difference between Harvard and the People's College of Law.

Law is an elitist profession and that's the way it should remain for everyone's good. If someone can't get into at least an ABA school, they have no business entering into the legal profession. And given the recent explosion of T3s and T4s, a legal education is now overly accessible to the common man as someone with a LSAT in the high 140s and a GPA in the high 2s can probably find somewhere that's ABA to take them.

On your feeling that it should be illegal to discriminate against someone based on where they went to school, pretend you're a hiring partner somewhere and you're interviewing two recent grads that are both in their early-mid 20s and have no relevant work experience. Would you really want to pick a guy from Appalachian, FAMU, or some CBA toilet that finished slightly above median over a guy from Columbia or Virginia that finished slightly below median and would you really pay them the same that you would have paid the guy from the better school, or maybe even more since they are apparently the better candidate based on their class rank?

Well, you shouldn't be surprised that I disagree with you. Given how facetious you've been, I'm not sure if I should even take you seriously, here. The fact of the matter is, not you or anyone else on this planet will ever convince me that the legal profession should remain elitist (and I do think it has made some tremendous strides away from this), nor will you ever be able to justify discrimination of any kind to me. How dare you? Foolish of you to even try.

As for your ABA-accredited comment, there are plenty of Massachusetts School of Law (a school which has taken the ABA head-on, and doesn't want accreditation for issues of access and affordability to the legal profession) graduates who have wiped the courtroom floor with graduates from ABA-accredited law schools (of all kinds), sometimes with mere procedural arguments. Access to the legal education apparatus is about more than just an acceptance, an arbitrary LSAT/GPA range, or some flawed four-tiered ranking system designed by U.S. News and World Report.

As for your hiring question, *tisk tisk*. I don't really understand the point of that question. If we go with your ABA-accreditation argument, what is the point of having a uniformed code of standards and norms (ABA accreditation process), if not to proceed with the understanding that law school graduates will be equally qualified and competent for the profession? As far as I'm concerned, an ABA-accredited school is an ABA-accredited school, and through that standard of expectation and uniformity, there should be no question that law school graduates are fundamentally equal and deserve equal pay for equal work. At this juncture, class rank, academic performance, grades, etc, do become important in distinguishing applicants in the decision-making processes, but by the standard of accreditation, the school you went to should not matter, since all schools are meeting the same standards that legitimate their existence to graduate law students. It should be noted that I reject any notion of aba-accredited vs. non-aba-accredited (I'm just making a more general point, here). Moreover, the fact of the matter is, law students learn what they know from their respective faculty. Students from perceived "lower-ranked" schools are taught by faculty from the very schools you've deemed as being "top" institutions, and vice versa. You're not necessarily going to be a better lawyer just because you graduated from Yale as oppose to MSU. Good lawyers are going to be good lawyers, no matter which school they attend!

The reality is, many big employers act inconsistently with this elitist notion you have. Howard University, a Tier 3 school, has just as many, if not more, big law employers recruiting (year after year after year after year) at their school as your perceived "top schools." In this instance, these graduates are on par with graduates of higher-ranked schools; they are on equal footing; they are being hired over other graduate from "top-tier" schools. Your argument is just ridiculous.

...

I'm not trying to convince you, just putting my $.02 out there.

On the Massachusetts School of Law example, it's not that surprising that some of their grads have beat some ABA grads, they're going to get a lot of chances. Each case is a new battle, and even the little guy wins sometimes. Lots of people have also successfully represented themselves in court, it still doesn't make them good lawyers. And why is the floor wipe analogy always used in these situations ("I've seen [Cooley/T4/Non-ABA] grads wipe the floor with [T14/ABA] grads")?

I like that you didn't answer my hiring question, just prattled on.

This, "Students from perceived 'lower-ranked' schools are taught by faculty from the very schools you've deemed as being 'top' institutions, and vice versa.", is just plain wrong. Go look at the faculty page for any T3/4. They might have a few grads from good schools (and "good" is usually going to mean somewhere like Tennessee or North Carolina, not Harvard or Columbia), but most of their profs are from either the school itself or a similarly situated school. And you're not going to be finding T3/4 grads teaching at T1/2 schools in any significant number. Maybe you'll get 1 per school in the T50 and they'll probably be teaching a clinic.

On hiring practices being inconsistent with my "law is elitist" view, Howard is a bull example and you know it. The reason Howard has such good placement given its rank is because its the only HBCU law school that's worth a damn. Try to find any other school in the entire T3 and T4 that comes close to Howard's placement rates. You can't, because no such place exists. Howard is a unique outlier, not an example. If Miami took on Howard's racial makeup, they'd probably out place half of the T14. And see the chart for my evidence that hiring practices are much more closely aligned to my view: